Owen Caissie’s first Wrigley Field weekend as a Cub was nearly spent as nothing more than a spectator.
The team’s top prospect, who was summoned from Triple-A Iowa for his big league debut last Thursday in Toronto, didn’t see any action in the three-game series with the Pirates until a pinch-hit pop out in the seventh inning of the Cubs’ 4-3 win Sunday.
It hasn’t been that long since manager Craig Counsell talked about a desire to only promote young players if there were opportunities for regular playing time, and there didn’t figure to be much opportunity for Caissie to crack an outfield that boasts three All Stars, with middle-of-the-order bat Seiya Suzuki the Cubs’ regular designated hitter.
Counsell said as much when asked Sunday about Caissie’s omission from his lineups.
“We’ve got a pretty good group of outfielders here. Owen’s got to cross that bar,” Counsell said. “We’re going to play the best guys every day. … And this is why we wrestled with calling him up, at times, because of the group of outfielders we have.”
But given the team’s run-scoring struggles — in 15 games this month, the Cubs have tallied more than four runs just three times — and the ongoing slumps of Ian Happ, Pete Crow-Armstrong, Kyle Tucker and Suzuki, the thought of Caissie finding an opening isn’t so crazy, especially to a fan base driven mad by the lack of offense.
Caissie, though, didn’t get anything more than the lone pinch-hit at-bat during a low-scoring weekend. And now the Cubs head into a pivotal five-game series with the division-leading Brewers in need of an offensive jolt.
Going by what Caissie did in Iowa, he could be capable of providing it. He had a .955 OPS and hit 22 home runs in 93 Triple-A games this season.
“Slumps, it’s a small look at somebody,” Counsell said. “Are you good enough to tell me the day they’re going to be themselves? Are any of us good enough to do that? So you default to playing the best players, with rest and all those other things taken into consideration.”
Whether it’s leaving Caissie on the bench or keeping hitters who are succeeding, like second baseman Nico Hoerner and third baseman Matt Shaw, at the bottom of the lineup, Counsell is continuing to show trust that the assemblage of hitters who produced such a strong first half can reheat in time to keep the NL Central race interesting.
“This is a good baseball team that’s proven itself,” Counsell said Saturday. “We haven’t scored some runs in a little bit of a stretch here. We will, because this is a good offense. That makes me optimistic, and it makes me know that we will score runs. We will be a good offense. So it’s easy to maintain that consistency.”
An eventual Amaya return?
Injured catcher Miguel Amaya could be back before the end of the season, according to Counsell.
The Cubs’ skipper updated Sunday that Amaya, who sprained his ankle during last week’s series against the Blue Jays, is dealing with a “moderate” sprain but might not be done for the year.
“It’s going to take a while,” Counsell said. “[Him returning for] the end of the season is not out of the question.”
